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During pre-conference negotiations with British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden, "Mr. Hiss brought up the question of China," according to Stettinius, "and stressed the importance which the United States attaches to U.S.-British-Soviet encouragement and support for an agreement between the [[Comintern|Commintern]] [sic] and the Chinese Congress [sic]."<ref>Edward R. Stettinius Jr., ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=v9N3AAAAMAAJ&pgis=1 The Diaries of Edward R Stettinius Jr , 1943-1946]'', edited by Thomas M. Campbell and George C. Herring (New York: New Viewpoints, 1975), ISBN 0531055701, p. 229. The official State Department record uses the passive voice to expunge Hiss' role in this maneuver: "The desirability of unity being achieved between the [[Kuomintang]] and the [[Communists]] was raised, and reference was made to the President having some doubts as to whether the British desired this unity." Meeting of the Foreign Ministers, February 1, 1945, 10:30 A.M., on Board H. M. S. "Sirius" in Grand Harbor. United States Department of State, ''[http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/FRUS.FRUS1945 Foreign Relations of the United States. Conferences at Malta and Yalta, 1945]'' (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1945), [http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=goto&id=FRUS.FRUS1945&isize=XL&submit=Go+to+page&page=502 p. 502] Press accounts relying on this bowdlerized official account thus reported, e.g.: "Alger Hiss, whose role at the Yalta conference long has been a subject for hostile speculation, spent his time there [http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40C11F6345A107A93CAA81788D85F418585F9 exclusively on planning for the United Nations]."</ref> The British, due to their interest in Hong Kong and Singapore, had influence with the [[Kuomintang]], but none with the [[Communists]]; the Soviets, who did have influence with the Communists, were not present. The only effect Hiss had in bringing up the issue therefore was to co-opt the British to pressure the Chinese government into acquiescing to a [[Kremlin]]-backed power-sharing arrangement with the rebels, thus granting a measure of legitimacy to forces dedicated to its destruction&mdash;a policy that would prove [http://www.hawaiireporter.com/story.aspx?1c1d76bb-290c-447b-82dd-e295ff0d3d59 catastrophic for the Chinese].<ref>"No Communist Chinese forces fought in any major battles of the Sino-Japanese war," reported General Albert Wedemeyer, [http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/20/obituaries/gen-albert-c-wedemeyer-92-noted-military-planner-for-us.html commander of American forces in China]. "Chinese Communist leaders were not interested in fighting the Japanese," he wrote; "their main interest was to occupy the territory which the Nationalist forces evacuated in their retreat." (Albert C. Wedemeyer, [http://books.google.com/books?id=64s_HgAACAAJ Wedemeyer Reports] [Holt, 1958], p. 285) The Japanese invaders and Communist rebels thus collaborated in a symbiotic ''de facto'' alliance against their common enemy, the Chinese army: The Communists used the Japanese to clear out the Nationalists, while the Japanese used the Communists to hold captured territory. Indeed, in May 1945, an OSS team code-named "Spaniel" that parachuted into China to link up with Communist forces was instead taken prisoner by the Communists, whom they found coexisting with Japanese troops. The Americans were held incommunicado until October, some two months after the end of the war. When finally freed, they reported, "The amount of actual fighting being carried on by the 8th R.A. [the “Eighth Route Army,” i.e., Communist Chinese rebels] has been grossly exaggerated. It was their policy to undertake no serious campaign against the Japanese..." (Maochun Yu, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=NJcolGHWfzoC OSS in China]'' [Yale University Press, 1997] ISBN 0300066988, pp. 220-223) Even so [http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse.pl?trx=vx&list=H-Diplo&month=0508&week=b&msg=TnHrvJBDZ3%2buWcV2D1Mwgw&user=&pw= ardent a pro-Communist] as Theodore White would have to admit, "The Communists...claimed that they held down most of the Japanese troops in China and that they bore the main weight of resistance; this was untrue." In fact, wrote White, "it was the weary soldiers of the Central Government who bore the shock, gnawed at the enemy, and died." (Theodore Harold White, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=ipdPd6kY7XwC Thunder out of China]'' (Da Capo Press, 1980) ISBN 0306801280, p. 210)</ref>

During pre-conference negotiations with British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden, "Mr. Hiss brought up the question of China," according to Stettinius, "and stressed the importance which the United States attaches to U.S.-British-Soviet encouragement and support for an agreement between the [[Comintern|Commintern]] [sic] and the Chinese Congress [sic]."<ref>Edward R. Stettinius Jr., ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=v9N3AAAAMAAJ&pgis=1 The Diaries of Edward R Stettinius Jr , 1943-1946]'', edited by Thomas M. Campbell and George C. Herring (New York: New Viewpoints, 1975), ISBN 0531055701, p. 229. The official State Department record uses the passive voice to expunge Hiss' role in this maneuver: "The desirability of unity being achieved between the [[Kuomintang]] and the [[Communists]] was raised, and reference was made to the President having some doubts as to whether the British desired this unity." Meeting of the Foreign Ministers, February 1, 1945, 10:30 A.M., on Board H. M. S. "Sirius" in Grand Harbor. United States Department of State, ''[http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/FRUS.FRUS1945 Foreign Relations of the United States. Conferences at Malta and Yalta, 1945]'' (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1945), [http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=goto&id=FRUS.FRUS1945&isize=XL&submit=Go+to+page&page=502 p. 502] Press accounts relying on this bowdlerized official account thus reported, e.g.: "Alger Hiss, whose role at the Yalta conference long has been a subject for hostile speculation, spent his time there [http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40C11F6345A107A93CAA81788D85F418585F9 exclusively on planning for the United Nations]."</ref> The British, due to their interest in Hong Kong and Singapore, had influence with the [[Kuomintang]], but none with the [[Communists]]; the Soviets, who did have influence with the Communists, were not present. The only effect Hiss had in bringing up the issue therefore was to co-opt the British to pressure the Chinese government into acquiescing to a [[Kremlin]]-backed power-sharing arrangement with the rebels, thus granting a measure of legitimacy to forces dedicated to its destruction&mdash;a policy that would prove [http://www.hawaiireporter.com/story.aspx?1c1d76bb-290c-447b-82dd-e295ff0d3d59 catastrophic for the Chinese].<ref>"No Communist Chinese forces fought in any major battles of the Sino-Japanese war," reported General Albert Wedemeyer, [http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/20/obituaries/gen-albert-c-wedemeyer-92-noted-military-planner-for-us.html commander of American forces in China]. "Chinese Communist leaders were not interested in fighting the Japanese," he wrote; "their main interest was to occupy the territory which the Nationalist forces evacuated in their retreat." (Albert C. Wedemeyer, [http://books.google.com/books?id=64s_HgAACAAJ Wedemeyer Reports] [Holt, 1958], p. 285) The Japanese invaders and Communist rebels thus collaborated in a symbiotic ''de facto'' alliance against their common enemy, the Chinese army: The Communists used the Japanese to clear out the Nationalists, while the Japanese used the Communists to hold captured territory. Indeed, in May 1945, an OSS team code-named "Spaniel" that parachuted into China to link up with Communist forces was instead taken prisoner by the Communists, whom they found coexisting with Japanese troops. The Americans were held incommunicado until October, some two months after the end of the war. When finally freed, they reported, "The amount of actual fighting being carried on by the 8th R.A. [the “Eighth Route Army,” i.e., Communist Chinese rebels] has been grossly exaggerated. It was their policy to undertake no serious campaign against the Japanese..." (Maochun Yu, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=NJcolGHWfzoC OSS in China]'' [Yale University Press, 1997] ISBN 0300066988, pp. 220-223) Even so [http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse.pl?trx=vx&list=H-Diplo&month=0508&week=b&msg=TnHrvJBDZ3%2buWcV2D1Mwgw&user=&pw= ardent a pro-Communist] as Theodore White would have to admit, "The Communists...claimed that they held down most of the Japanese troops in China and that they bore the main weight of resistance; this was untrue." In fact, wrote White, "it was the weary soldiers of the Central Government who bore the shock, gnawed at the enemy, and died." (Theodore Harold White, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=ipdPd6kY7XwC Thunder out of China]'' (Da Capo Press, 1980) ISBN 0306801280, p. 210)</ref>

Ultimately, [[Franklin Roosevelt|Roosevelt]] made a secret agreement with [[Stalin]] ([[Winston Churchill|Churchill]] was [http://www.pbs.org/behindcloseddoors/in-depth/the-conferences.html#Argonaut2 not informed]), giving [[Moscow]] rights to the main Manchurian railroad and territory in northern China.<ref>Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=XjW49VTRhxQC The End of the Pacific War: Reappraisals]'' (Stanford University Press, 2007) ISBN 0804754276, p. 156</ref> Hiss would later deny under oath any role in China policy at Yalta, or in the subsequent State Department proclamation calling for "peace and unity with the Communists in China," saying "It was not in my area of activity at all." Hiss admitted that he "had been connected with far eastern affairs before," but protested that after "about February 1944, [a year before he "stressed the importance" of unity with the Communists] I was assigned to United Nations work and [http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/hiss/8-5testimony.html specialized entirely] in that field thereafter."

Ultimately, [[Franklin Roosevelt|Roosevelt]] made a secret agreement with [[Stalin]] ([[Winston Churchill|Churchill]] was [http://www.pbs.org/behindcloseddoors/in-depth/the-conferences.html#Argonaut2 not informed]), giving [[Moscow]] rights to the main Manchurian railroad and territory in northern China.<ref>Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=XjW49VTRhxQC The End of the Pacific War: Reappraisals]'' (Stanford University Press, 2007) ISBN 0804754276, p. 156</ref> Hiss would later deny under oath any role in China policy at Yalta, or in the subsequent State Department proclamation calling for "peace and unity with the Communists in China," saying "It was not in my area of activity at all." Hiss admitted that he "had been connected with far eastern affairs before," but protested that after "about February 1944, [a year before he "stressed the importance" of unity with the Communists] I was assigned to United Nations work and [http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/hiss/8-5testimony.html specialized entirely] in that field thereafter."

According to Sudoplatov, "One of the officials [at Yalta] we had established confidential relations with was Alger Hiss," who was "highly sympathetic to the interests of the Soviet Union."<ref>Anatoli Sudoplatov, Pavel Sudoplatov, Leona P. Schecter and Jerrold L. Schecter, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=lt8FHQAACAAJ Special Tasks: The Memoirs of an Unwanted Witness, a Soviet Spymaster]'' (New York: Back Bay Books, 1995) ISBN 0316821152, p. 227</ref> According to confidential [[GRU]] sources, during the conference, Hiss gave daily briefings to Stalin's military adviser, General Mikhail Abramovich Milshtein (deputy director of the GRU), revealing not only the American negotiating strategy but insights into the attitudes of the American negotiators.<ref>Jerrold and Leona Schecter, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=M2pbieYYHrYC Sacred Secrets: How Soviet Intelligence Operations Changed American History]''(Washington: Potomac Books Inc., 2002) ISBN 1574883275, p. 130</ref> Sudoplatov added:

According to Sudoplatov, "One of the officials [at Yalta] we had established confidential relations with was Alger Hiss," who was "highly sympathetic to the interests of the Soviet Union."<ref>Anatoli Sudoplatov, Pavel Sudoplatov, Leona P. Schecter and Jerrold L. Schecter, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=lt8FHQAACAAJ Special Tasks: The Memoirs of an Unwanted Witness, a Soviet Spymaster]'' (New York: Back Bay Books, 1995) ISBN 0316821152, p. 227</ref> According to confidential [[GRU]] sources, during the conference, Hiss gave daily briefings to Stalin's military adviser, General Mikhail Abramovich Milshtein (deputy director of the GRU), revealing not only the American negotiating strategy but insights into the attitudes of the American negotiators.<ref>Jerrold and Leona Schecter, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=M2pbieYYHrYC Sacred Secrets: How Soviet Intelligence Operations Changed American History]''(Washington: Potomac Books Inc., 2002) ISBN 1574883275, p. 130</ref> Sudoplatov added: